action of knowing that Julie will never
again fascinate, and the Baron will never again be given an opportunity
of preparing his fatal snap-dragon."

My friendliness with Zuroff stood us in good stead; for, a week later,
Bindo and Blythe contrived to get a very pretty diamond necklet and pair
of earrings from a lady in Petersburg, which fetched six hundred golden
louis in Amsterdam.

CHAPTER XI

THE PERIL OF PIERRETTE

I

CONCERNS A STRANGE CONSPIRACY

Dusk was falling early in Piccadilly as I sat in the car outside the
Royal Automobile Club, awaiting the reappearance of my master.

The grey February afternoon had been bitterly cold, and for an hour I
had waited there half frozen. Since morning Count Bindo di Ferraris and
myself had been on the road, coming up from Shrewsbury, and, tired out,
I was anxious to get into the garage.

As chauffeur to a trio of perhaps the most expert "crooks" in Europe, my
life was the reverse of uneventful. I was constantly going hither and
thither, often on all-night journeys, and always moving rapidly from
place to place, often selling the old car and buying a new one, and
constantly on the look-out for police-traps of more than one variety.

Only a week previously the Count had handed me five hundred pounds in
Bank of England notes, telling me to sell the forty horse-power
six-cylinder "Napier," which, still a magnificent car, might easily be
"spotted," and to purchase a "sixty" of some other make. By that I knew
that some fresh scheme was afoot, and our run to Shrewsbury and
Barmouth, in North Wales, had been to test the capabilities of the new
"Mercedes" I had purchased a couple of days previously, and in which I
now sat.

It was certainly as fine a car as was on the road, its open exhaust a
little noisy perhaps, but capable of getting up a tremendous speed when
occasion required. A long, dark-red body, it was fitted with every
up-to-date convenience, even to the big electric horn placed in the
centre of the radiator, an instrument which emitted a deep warning blast
unlike the tone of air-horns, and sounding as long as ever the finger
was kept upon the button placed on the driving-wheel.

In every way the car was perfect. I fancy that I know something about
cars, but even with my object to lower the price I failed to discover
any defect in her in any particular.

Suddenly the Count, in a big motor coat and cap, emerged from the Club,
ran hurriedly down the step